Welcome to Tavern Talk Thursday! This is a weekly column where we chat with a member of the TTRPG (tabletop roleplaying game) community to learn more about how they found themselves at the table, what they love about tabletop gaming and other fun things. Think of it as a little sneak peeks into the minds of our fellow players and DMs.
It’s time for a break from all that adventuring, and we have the best way to relax. This week, DM and epic storyteller Dennis Robinson is here to chat all about TTRPGs. When he isn’t gracing our ears with Botched: A D&D Podcast, he spends his time writing graphic novels about the world’s first werewolf. The first book in the Lycan: Solomon’s Odyssey series is available now, with the second releasing soon. Check out everything Dennis shared about his time at the table and learn why you should always befriend a turkey!
Keep up with Dennis Robinson on his socials! (Twitter/Instagram)
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Dennis Robinson
Julia Roth: Let’s chat about your TTRPG backstory! How did you find yourself at the table?
Dennis Robinson: First adventure I ever went on was back in Highschool! I was invited to play D&D; back then, it was 4th Edition. Funny that so many people despise that edition, but since it was my first experience with the game, I loved it! I played off and on into college until everyone went their separate ways. Back around 2014 or 2015, we started playing D&D 2e and 5e with our local friends. We fell off shortly before I took over the DM role, and we got a regular play schedule. In early 2016 we launched Botched: A D&D Podcast with a few of the members of that local group. Through that group, I now have the internet title of “The Worlds Most Okayest DM.”
JR: Favorite world to adventure in?
DR: My favorite world to adventure in has been visited twice. Once before the podcast began and then again in Season 4 of Botched. 1932 New York City. These were Lovecraftian-themed adventures. I chose New York because it’s a melting pot of cultures. So, I pulled mythology and all manner of monsters from cultures all over the world, such as the leshi, gashadokuro, and the drop bear, to name a few. I even made an overly elaborate treasure map that only the craziest person would have ever solved in order to find the hoar.
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JR: Favorite one-shot adventure?
DR: This one is tough because we have had so many fun one-offs. We do a one-off every month for our Patrons. Some really memorable ones include Space Vikings (where I play Chief Turtle Engineer Yrtle the Tyrtle, Minnesota Space Viking), Drunk Girl Adventures, where the players all play drunk girls in San Francisco, and the quest giver is a woman crying in the bathroom. But my favorite was a quest spot I did with Adventure Inc. They decided they wanted to have it dog themed because the DM of their show doesn’t like dogs. There was also mention of the old Wishbone show.
So, I had the players playing Wishbone’s assistant, and they were the keepers of stories. They lived in the universe of books and had to ensure that they happened the way they were written because the evildoers were trying to undo the books. In this instance, they had to go into the book Where The Red Fern Grows and ensure all the events of the book took place. If you know that book, that is a pretty dark task. Well, the hilarity of players roleplaying a bunch of dogs while trying to functionally use guns or dress up as mountain lions led to some pretty fantastic moments.
JR: Backstory or class first?
DR: When I go into a one-off or campaign as a player, I always think up a backstory first. What kind of character do I want to play? Once I have that idea in my head, I pick the class that I think best suits that story, and then I pick the race that I think best suits the class.
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JR: Favorite spell and why?
DR: I don’t really play spell casters. It always felt like way too much work to keep track of, and it was always more fun for me to be creative with how I would attack enemies with melee or ranged attacks. I CAN tell you my LEAST favorite spell to deal with as a DM – The Tiny Hut. Sometimes I will just straight up ban the spell from the game just because I find it breaks the game.
JR: Who has been your favorite character to play?
DR: My favorite character to play was in a Scooby-Doo-esque adventure set in a standard D&D environment. I played a half-orc wizard named Grendelrod, The Splendiferous. He was naked, wearing only a “bear” skullcap and had intelligence as my dump stat. His spells were not really spells. He just cast “Punch” or “Club” and then hit the opponent. I was convinced that every caper was committed by a skeleton. I was proved right time and again, as the incredibly strong half-orc would “remove” the skin mask to reveal a skeleton underneath.
JR: Do you have a particular race/class you enjoy?
DR: I really enjoy warforged because if you have a DM that lets you get creative, you can do lots of fun creative things with that race in terms of modifying them. I remember wanting to create a grappling hook arm that you could then use a hand crank to reel it back in or reel you towards it. As far as class, barbarian is, was, and will always be my favorite. Hits like a tank and can take a lot of damage. Less thinking, more roleplaying.
JR: Is there something that you build into every character? A fun trait or a special item?
DR: Every character is their own; there isn’t really something I carry from character to character…except a ridiculous name and voice. I think I’m allergic to playing serious characters.
JR: What is your favorite system to play within?
DR: D&D 5e, but we play with a lot of homebrewed rules.
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JR: Tell us about the wildest adventure you have been on?
DR: I DM’d a one-off adventure based on an offhand comment made during one of our episodes in Season 3. It ended up being a Thanksgiving-themed adventure. The main character of the story, Meric Hwaet, was a paladin from a well-to-do family. They tend to spread a lot of religious propaganda. However, he decided at some point he wanted to expand his family’s empire to turkey farming. He was convinced that in order to grow turkeys, you would kill living turkeys and then plant them upside down.
This would then grow new turkeys. This was a colossal failure until one night when corrupted soil created Goblox, a giant mutated turkey with metal feathers that breathes fire. It raged across the countryside, causing havoc. The group tracked the turkey down, and then Meric Hwaet realized it was just lonely. After cornering the turkey in a cave, he convinced the turkey that he was the turkey’s friend and that he would love the turkey always. The turkey believed him and was led out of the cave as a giant guillotine chopped the turkey’s head off. Happy Thanksgiving!
JR: What has been your most impactful moment at a table?
DR: In our 2nd season of Botched, we had a campaign set in our world, but due to nuclear fallout, people went underground for hundreds or thousands of years. When they re-emerged, they found that most animals became humanoid. My players rarely follow conventional thinking and wander off the path to do something else. In this instance, they wanted to go way out of the way to visit the moose village. I created a peace summit at the moose village, where they were trying to broker peace between four factions of rabbit folk. The peace talks were in a stadium, and as the talks were about to begin, they discovered a bomb under the table.
Half the group tried to evacuate people, while the other half tried to defuse the bomb. They ended up setting off the bomb, killing one party member and many others. The following episodes dealt with the aftermath. This ended up being very heavy because, in the real world, there was also a bombing in London around the same time. In the end, they discovered that the rabbit folk had enslaved tortoise folk to create their weapons, and the tortoise folk had set the bomb to try to reveal what the rabbits had done. The tone of the section was very heavy…until they realized that I based the entire story loosely on the tortoise and the hare. Then they hated me.
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JR: Favorite dice to use?
DR: That depends. For regular use, my friend bought me a set of titanium dice from Norse Foundry. They are heavy as hell! They dent the table every time. However, we have a house rule. If you roll a critical 1, I then roll a D100. If the results are 90-94, it results in the permanent loss of a limb. But, if it’s 95-100 or 69 (because we’re children and 69 counts as 100), it results in permanent death. I have a black D10 and a white D10 that I have always used to roll for those botch determinations. In addition, over the last year or so, one of our listeners gifted us a body dice. It’s a large D12 covered in various body parts. Whatever I roll determines which body part gets removed!
JR: Would you rather face off against an entire dungeon of undead or charm your way through a royal court?
DR: As a DM, I would prefer the royal court because, from a content creation standpoint, I think the roleplaying of attempting to charm a royal court and the eventual failure will be hilarious. As a player, I love playing dumb, uncharismatic barbarians who love to smash enemies. As a player, I will take on the dungeon of the undead!
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JR: Favorite TTRPG Monster?
DR: My favorite TTRPG monster isn’t really in any book. In our NYC campaign before Botched existed, there was a living hotel. A group of black-eyed individuals would trick people into staying at the hotel, and then the hotel would eat them. Once inside, it was not easy to get back out, so it was like being stuck in a giant monster made to look like a hotel. They had to use skills as well as their wits in order to get out alive.
JR: Good luck charms or rituals before a game?
DR: I don’t have any rituals before a game, BUT if I’m rolling a new character, I will roll all my D6s and then choose the best performing 4 in order to then roll my stats. It almost never works.
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JR: Who is sitting at your dream table?
DR: Kevin Conroy, Stephen Colbert, Patton Oswalt, Robin Williams, and Felicia Day. They would be fun and creative, and I would love to hear the crazy characters and shenanigans they can come up with.
JR: What are you most looking forward to within the TTRPG world?
DR: I look forward to all the different ideas that people can come up with in order to facilitate creative play. For instance, a friend of the show and patron created a TTRPG called The Midnight World, which is based around fear and PTSD. It’s really creative and adds a really fun roleplaying dimension. I love when people can take what’s already working about TTRPGs and then add their own spin or two cents that up the ability for players to be creative.
https://www.geekgirlauthority.com/tavern-talk-thursday-alex-platt/
Who I Am: A nerd by the strictest definition. I enjoy diving straight into my favorite fandoms without a care in the world. I live on video/board games, fantasy movies and TV, and all things geeky.
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